Solar Storms and You!

Activity 16 : Solar Storms and Satellites

Introduction

Solar storms have long been known to affect delicate electronic circuitry
in satellites orbiting the Earth. Given that the commercial, military and
scientific satellite resources exceed $200 billion dollars, the issue of
satellite vulnerability to solar storm damage is both a serious consideration
in satellite design, but also a highly controversial topic when specific
instances are examined in detail.

Objective

Materials

Procedure

Students read "Forecasting Solar Storms" and complete the questions.

Discuss the answers and the article.

Students read "Solar Storm Eyed as Satellite Killer".

Construct a graphic organizer to compare and to contrast the two articles.
Some of the items mentioned in both are: $200 million Telestar 401 satellite,
and the SOHO satellite. Both articles deal with the 1997 event, Stephen
P. Maran's quote, "This is the first time a solar event has been
captured from cradle to grave", January 7 event, 3 3/4 days to reach the
Earth, and other spacecraft that monitored the event.

Complete the remaining questions.

Key Terminology

Coronal Mass Ejection: A sudden expulsion of matter from the coronal
regions of the Sun with typical speeds of millions of miles per hour.
Magnetic sub-storm: A rapid change in a portion of the magnetic
field of the Earth lasting hours to minutes.

Conclusions

Communication satellites can be affected by solar storms, and in the coming
years there will be hundreds more placed into orbit. There are many uses for
satellites in the 1990's, can you name some common applications?

Related Web Resources

Visit the IMAGE/POETRY
Solar
Storms:Hidden Menace article written by Dr. Odenwald to learn more about
how solar storms affect our technology.